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Day 12: Jewel Cave and Badlands National Park

Today was my second day in the Black Hills area near Rapid City, South Dakota.  It was a good stay at the Bavarian Inn in the hills near Custer, very friendly staff and comfortable room. I was also happy to wake up with the car fully charged from the Tesla destination charger at the Inn. I headed out from the hotel early so I could reach Jewel Cave National Monument by 8am, when the visitor center opened. After my experience not being able to get cave tour tickets at Wind Cave, I wanted to make sure I got tickets today. Even though I was 3rd in line, I got the last ticket for the 10am tour. Phew!



I used the free time till the tour to do the Canyons Trail hike there.  It was a pleasant hike through the area above the Jewel caves and the surrounding canyon. By the end of the hike, light rain started. It was great timing, because the cave tour for 90 minutes was underground, while it rained outside.

 

The cave tour itself was fascinating. They have discovered about 215 miles at multiple levels of interconnected tunnels and this is only an estimated 5% of all the tunnels there. Of course, the tour only covered about 1 mile of walking.





After the Jewel cave visit, I headed onto Badlands National Park and drove the 40 miles scenic loop through the park. Stopped at various vista points and did several short hikes. 






After exiting Badlands National Park, stopped for a quick Tesla supercharger stop and dinner at Wall Drug, an old store that has become a big tourist stop and attraction. There are hundreds of signs on the roads around pointing the way to Wall Drug.


The drive from Wall Drug to my cottage in Spearfish, South Dakota was another instance where directions provided by Google maps and Tesla navigation were wrong and sent me around in loops due to road construction closures on the freeway. I guess this kind of real time changes confused the heck out of them.

The raw numbers for the day:

  • 295 miles driving, 16800 steps walking
  • 1 Tesla supercharger stop
  • 1 state - South Dakota

 

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